Till We Have Faces (part 2)
by star wars for Jesus
Summary: In the wake of the events of "Crisis on Naboo", Obi-Wan Kenobi, Anakin Skywalker, and Padme Amidala are swept into a tenuous personal conflict.
1. Till We Have Faces (part 2)

_"Wounds from a friend can be trusted, but an enemy multiplies kisses."—Proverbs 27:6_

_A _crack_ of blastfire, revebrating through the chill night air, drills into a man. A living, laughing, loving being. A friend, a mentor, a brother—he is all these, but death is no respecter of status. It grabs us, wrenches us all from this realm at some point or another, and as the blaster bolts drills through chest and skin and heart…I feel reality begin to unwind._

_ And then he plummets, falling, falling, falling…_

"Anakin?"

The sheer utterance of my name jolts me out of this dark reverie, this delving of my mind into hell. Because I remember, tell myself, _I'm not there_. Not on that rooftop, strobes of Coruscant lights playing across my features as the sniper fires an ultimatum. I'm not there, watching a single hyphen of light streak toward my friend, and I no longer see his boneless form twisting to the distant ground. I'm _here_, seated in Chancellor Palpatine's decorous office, meeting the milky gaze of the man himself with a long sigh.

I give my head a quick shake, try to rid it of lingering memory-ghosts. "Sorry, Chancellor. I was…I'm still trying to sort this all out, I guess."

The Chancellor's thin, wan lips pull into a kindly smile. "Don't be, my boy. Your reaction to all this—to thinking your friend was dead, then finding him alive—is natural. _Quite_ natural, I should say: after all, the whole of the GAR is still reeling from his death." His pale eyes warm. "Even Commander Cody is a little addled by everything."

Ah, yes. Obi-Wan's "death". It's a surreal thing, the way events have transpired: one moment, I'm watching his body descend into a crematorium, on all sides surrounded by weeping friend and comrades. The next…well, I'm face-to-face with a rugged mask, all angles and hard lines, and the man wearing it is him. Is Obi-Wan, clean-shaven and garbed in armor and bandoliers, face warped far beyond recognition and voice a raspy, mechanized dirge.

And as I met his familiar blue-grey gaze and watched those copper brows tilt in words inexpressible, I knew. Realized that something was different, that there had been a change between us. That there's a rift, its gaping maw forced apart by circumstances that should've never been.

I knew—and I know—that he _lied._

"Something else is troubling you, isn't it?" Palpatine queries, head canted. He leans forward, knitting his bony fingers together on his desk, and in a lower voice, "you know you can say it, Anakin. I won't judge you—never have, never will—for simply proclaiming truth."

But that's just it. It—this, that, whatever—_isn't simple_. It's messy, convoluted, a veritable labyrinth of deception and broken trust. And it hurts. Like crap. So even saying it—that sends pain, sharp and astonishingly raw, coursing through my veins. "Chancellor, with all due respect, I—"

The Chancellor lifts a hand, cutting me off. "Anakin, Anakin, Anakin: _please._ I know what's troubling you."

I snap up, spine straight against the back of my over-stuffed chair. Great. Just great; after all, last thing I want is to spill my heart, let is gush onto this carmine floor. Because maybe, just maybe, allowing it to flow will break…everything. "I don't feel like talking about this."

"I know. I would feel the same if I were under the impression that a friend had lied to me."

"He didn't lie to hurt me," I point out rigidly.

"Of course. He was doing it protect me, wasn't he? He should be hailed as a hero, even." He leans forward more, plants knife-like elbows on his desk. "But you want to know what I think, Anakin? It's that _it doesn't matter_. Lying is lying, hurt is hurt, and when you get down to it, he did both. And he knew it."

A muscle leaps in my jaw. "He apologized afterward, Chancellor. He was sorry, sorry that he'd made the decision to keep me in the dark."

Palpatine cocks a thin, snowy brow. "Sorry he deceived you…or sorry he was caught in the act?"

"Neither. Both." I slump in my chair, drag a hand down my angular face. "I don't know, honestly. Not anymore."

"And why is that, Anakin?"

"I don't know," I repeat. But I do. I know, grasp it all with my mind. Want to shout it out, release all the doubt-shadows writhing in my thoughts, tell him that I hardly trust anyone. Even Padme, her umber eyes locked to mine as the inward monsters rage on, reminding me that I am engulfed by liars. "It's…I can't really put a finger on it, Chancellor. I hope you can appreciate that."

Another warm, doting-uncle smile touches Palpatine's mouth. "Of course, my boy. I'm only interested in helping you through this."

I straighten. "And how you would go about doing this?"

"I couldn't really say, I'm afraid," replies Palpatine, spreading his hands in a helpless gesture. "All I know is that doubts are like mysteries; once they are uncovered, laid bare for all to see, they can either be proven or disproven. And the more naked they are, the more sure the truth."

"Are you suggesting that I should—" Eyes going round, I cut myself off. No. No, I cannot accept this, not in a million lifetimes. I'd rather slash my own throat, listening as scarlet life patters on the floor.

But the Chancellor's merely nodding stoically, as if he's somehow in favor of the unthinkable. "I am, Anakin. I'm asking you to spy on him."


	2. Till We Have Faces (part 3)

"_Place me like a seal over your heart, like a seal on your arm; for love is as strong as death, its jealousy demanding as the grave. It burns like blazing fire, like a might flame."—Song of Songs 8:6_

It's dizzying, this place. The Senate Rotunda, the crowning splendor Coruscant…it's a twisting labyrinth of halls and hallways, of passages and opulent vestibules, of arching ceilings and deep, scarlet carpet. And people. Great, swelling throngs of them, surging about me like a tempest wild as I try to locate my office.

After what seems like an infinitum of swimming through bustling crowds, I locate it. I stop before the door, all rich mahogany and platinum guild, and scan the label card mounted on the frame: _Amidala, Padme._ Yes, yes—that's me. My own space, labeled with my own name, prepared for my own use.

Brushing a lock of chestnut hair away from my face, I punch numbers into my keycode. The screen flashes brilliant jade, dances with numbers and instructions, and then it bleeps. With a snap-hiss, I can hear the locking mechanism within the door being withdrawn, and I grab the door handle, twisting it to open. Push open the door, hears it subtle creak as I enter into my office.

Then it's snap-hissing again, and I'm staring into the face of a dead man.

"Hello, Senator," says Obi-Wan Kenobi cordially, dipping his head. "Your handmaidens said you would be open to a private meeting around this hour."

Something in me wants to scream, bolt out the door and hail the nearest security guard. Except—well, I just _can't_, I guess. I can't deny the earnest light in his eyes, the hint of a smile that Anakin has taught him to embrace. Can't drag him into trouble, even if he's trespassing.

And about that… "How'd you get in here?"

He shrugs, demure. "The official explanation is that one of your handmaidens was kind enough to let me in."

"And the _unofficial_ would be…?"

"Here on business ordered directly by the Jedi Council." Standing in the far corner of my office, he takes a hesitant step forward, into the anemic light of an overhead light. "Senator…Padme…I'm here to discuss to Anakin. His behavior of late has been a bit—how should I put this?—_unnerving."_

My tongue is poised to ask him to elaborate on this when I notice. He's…_different._ Drastically so. His head's been shaved, leaving nothing but alabaster scalp and peachy fuzz, and his characteristic beard is nowhere to be seen. Probably shaved, too, I tell myself; but I can't help gawking at his clean-shaven jaw, so young and smooth and un-Obi-Wan-like that it's almost grotesque.

He must notice me leering, because he's smiling a little, hand stroking his naked chin. "You haven't heard the news yet, have you? Oh, well: now's a good a time as any to share." His gaze goes distant, defocusing as the smile fades. "The rumors of my death were obviously false: I faked my own death to assume the identity of my assassin, Rako Hardeen. But we—Mace, Yoda and I—had to keep this under wraps. At least, until we were certain Chancellor Palpatine was no longer in any imminent danger."

I stare at him, unblinking and slack-jawed. "You-I thought-Anakin said—"

"Never mind any of that. It's…all in the past." He clears his throat, clasps his hands behind his back. "Has Anakin—and I know you two are closer than you let on—said anything to you about meeting with the Chancellor, either today or yesterday?"

"Why should I know?" I retort defensively, arms folding across my chest.

Sighing, Obi-Wan pinches the bridge of his nose. "Padme…please. Don't take me for a fool. I know that you two are…" Another sigh. "Let's just leave it at that, shall we? Don't ask, don't tell?"

"Alright."

"Alright," he echoes, nodding to himself. "Now, about Anakin: The Council is worried that he might be divulging secrets to Chancellor. Not deliberately, mind you—and I don't believe that Palpatine would _do_ anything underhanded with this information—but I still worry."

My heart drums, eager to be free, to forget rib-cage shackles and binders. Anakin isn't simply the boy Obi-Wan trained, the wet-under-the-ears kid who became a hero to millions. Not me to, anyway. In my heart, in the secret place where desire swells, he is _mine_. My own, like the office or mahogany door. And he is mine alone, a man broad-shouldered and dark who rises from silver moon to kiss my neck, hands roaming from chest to waist.

He is my husband, an embodied piece of my very soul.

What Obi-Wan's saying: it can't be true, can it? _Can it_? Urgent, I search Kenobi's eyes, hope to leech something out of those azure depths. "What kind of secrets could he be disclosing?"

He shakes his head. "I'm not sure, but I observed Anakin behaving questionably this morning. Force-knows what was on his mind, but I caught him trying to access restricted materials in the Jedi archives."

Furrowed brow creating canyons and plateaus, I frown, and I frown deep. Anakin reading? I purse my lips, try to quell a derisive snort- he's never been one to read, that Anakin. And when he does, it's almost always required. Is totally devoid of any pleasure, any motivation aside from obedience…or fear of getting caught skimping on lessons. "What type of information do you believe he was trying access, and why?"

"Again, I'm not really certain _why_," he admits, fingering his phantom-beard. "But after he was gone, I was sure to check exactly _what_ he was trying to get a peek at, and it turned out to be something worrying." He meets my gaze full-on, the azure oceans freezing over. "He was trying to find my alias."

"Your alias?" I repeat, a little awed and nonplussed at the same time. "Obi-Wan—are you trying to tell me that you have…_another identity_?"

The corners of his bare mouth lift in a half-smile. "Not anything that saucy, I'm afraid. But my alias, if revealed, could put future operations at stake, and could cost me my life if it comes to." He frowns suddenly, as if something's just occurred to him. "He hasn't mentioned anything that would sound like an alias, has he? Mine has three letters, and it sounds little like a pet name."

"No, I can't say I have."

"Good. I—" He stops abruptly, freezing. His eyes go wide, his jaw turns to steel, and his entire body—that conglomerate of muscle and tendon the Jedi have honed to veritable weapons—tenses. And do I, feel my heart thrum as he reaches for something within the depths of his cloak, draws back a silvery canister and cocks it high.

Blood pure ice, I whisper, "What is it?"

Unlit lightsaber still brought high, he doesn't say make a response. He's cocking his head, eyes narrowed to lupine slits, and I think I know why. After all, I hear it, too: the sound of boots, solid and heavy, clump, clump, clumping down the hall.

Obi-Wan relaxes visibly, returns his lightsaber to its spot on his belt. "Let's just hope he doesn't come in here, shall we?"

Dry-mouthed, I nod. And I hope, wish with all my being that no one will knock at that door, that I won't be caught between the squaring-off of two titans. Funny thing about hope, though: it's a fragile thing, a sheet of glass pure that will shatter if allowed to slip. Because that's it made for, you see, and that's what happens: Anakin Skywalker pauses, raps hard on the door.

"Padme, I know you're in there," I hear him say, voice sludgy with emotion. He inhales sharply, then: "Wait—is that _Obi-Wan_ I sense? Why in blazes is _he_ here?"

Obi-Wan takes a long, self-conscious step back, creating a little more distance between us. "I could ask the same of you, my friend. Did you have an appointment as well?"

"If I did, it would be my business," he retorts sharply.

Obi-Wan's gaze turns back on me, the oceans now soft. Human. And…is that a flicker of understanding I catch, an allusion that says he knows, _knows_ what I might be feeling? "Senator, I can be on my way if it makes things easier…"

My nod is almost involuntary, unconscious. "If you would be so kind, Master Kenobi."

The Jedi Master dips his head with an urbane little flourish, and I reach for the door. Watch Obi-Wan slip out, hear him exchange something inaudible with Anakin, and let him creep in. Close the door, hear it snap-hiss, my heart thudding as the dark man gathers me into his arms. As he clutches me, hold me oh-so tight against his firm breast.

But when I don't melt in his embrace, don't fuse into his smoldering body, he goes rigid. He holds me at arm's lengths, does a once over with a gaze bemused, then steps back. Creates a rift between us, a valley I wish to cross but can't. Not without his warm, steady hands, guiding me gently over that abyss.

"Something…_happened_, didn't it?" Anakin demands, voice low. Edgy. "Something's going on between you and Obi-Wan."

What? _What_? No, Anakin—_no, no, no._ My heart beats solely for you, for your blazing strengths and weaknesses and everything.

But instead I say, "Don't be ridiculous, Anakin! Just listen to yourself, how crazy that accusation sounds coming out of your mouth, and you'd know that you lost your head."

"Am I so crazy?" he snaps, blue eyes charged with invisible, shimmering red. "Only a few days ago I thought I could trust that man. But it turns out that he was _lying to me_, and he hurt me in every way." His sclera burns, alive and throbbing. "This 'accusation'—that'd be just another lie, another wound."

"I'm not lying!" I protest, loud enough that I know that adjacent rooms will have overheard. "For star's sake, Anakin, just _think_. You've always been able to trust me. I kept your secret about the Tuskens, didn't I?" I shake my head. "Besides, I think he was every reason to be distrustful of us. I mean, we do lie to him on a daily basis."

Anakin sags against a wall. "I know."

"And he did what he did to save Palpatine."

I expect him to nod, grunt his agreement. But he doesn't. He stays silent, stares at a wall that must be writhing with monster but to my eyes is simply there, white and true.

"Lying is lying," he finally mutters, then slithers out the door.


	3. Till We Have Faces (part 4)

Swathed in soft, bluish light, I sit alone in my quarters, back pressed to an ice-cold wall. A sheet of flimsi, so thin as to be semi-transparent, lies in my lap. Waits there against my trousers and skin, wordlessly pleading that I scrawl more words across it hungry surface. That I fill it will more flowing, curving arches that somehow say things, speak them loud when I am cowed to silence.

Sighing, I give in to those demands. I scrawl. I let arches twist fluid across delicate flimsi, the shapes ebony dark and indelible. And I watch ideas, observe very thoughts begin to take shape before my eyes, speaking the unspeakable.

_ My name is Obi-Wan Kenobi, and I-I am_ alive_. I'm still breathing. Still standing, laughing in the face of that consuming maw that is death. Wishing—wishing _deep_—that I could share this breathing-standing-laughing life with—_

Suddenly, I feel something vibrate within my tunic. I hear a tinny chime, catch light pulsing under cloth, and grope around till my fingers are wrapping about something solid. It's my comm-link, this something- a collection of wires and machinery that speaks with voices far-off—so I activate it, my thumb pressing to the flashing TALK button.

"Kenobi," I say, holding the device to my lips.

Static sound, crackling loud before Padme's voice rings clear: "_Obi-Wan, it's me again…and I'm afraid Anakin's meeting with the Chancellor. Again."_

"Again?" I echo. "But it's only been two days since they last met!"

"_I know. It worried me, so I decided to call you. Let you know what was going on."_

Pursing my lips, I finger the furry shadows that are the closest things I have to a beard. "What would you have me do, Senator?"

A faint rustling sound emanates from the device, then: "_Where are you, and how soon can you be here?"_

My fingers curl tight around my flimsi, crumpling it against my chest. In this life, there really are things you would rather forget, would rather toss to the whirlwind and lose forever—but you can't. _I_ can't. All I can see is Anakin's face, etched hard in shadow; all I see is the eyes in the face, so much bluer than my own, glinting with a dangerous spark. Shimmering with quiet warning, laying claim to something—someone—he holds dear.

"Senator, I appear to be in the middle of something at the moment, and—"

"_There's no time!"_ she interjects shrilly. "_Obi-Wan, there's something else going on here, something beyond Anakin. It feels like…we're not seeing everything."_

I cock a brow, lifting it straight the crest of my alabaster scalp. "You believe Palpatine might be putting him up to something?"

_"Not Palpatine. Someone else, someone lurking in the shadows…"_ She trails off, makes a dry, swallowing sound. "_Yesterday, when you said the Council had sent you to speak with me…did you receive the order face-to-face?"_

Suddenly, I'm pushing to my feet, flimsi slipping to the floor. No. This…this isn't _right_. This rankles putrid, is redolent of things so dark I want to keep my eyes shut to them—and shut tight. "If I'm recalling this correctly, they sent me a text via datapad…"

"_So it could've been anyone, then."_

"Precisely. Hold on, Senator: I'll be with you in a moment."

Tugging on a cloak, I race to the hangars, mind whizzing with nightmarish possibilities. Palpatine…is _he_ the one who convinced Anakin to try and dig-up my alias? And if so, why? My thoughts bloom, swelling with endless answers as I straddle a speed-bike, zipping through Coruscant air-traffic till I catch sight of Padme's opulent apartment.

Settling daintily on the lips of her veranda, I hop off, robes billowing as I step over a marble threshold. This portion of her apartment is open to the world, a gaping vestibule awash in bleeding Coruscant sun. Not very practical, if you ask me: it would be simple, so _childishly easy_ to break into her apartment, to slip in and dash away unnoticed. But since I figure that she already has a man doing just that, loves a shadow who slithers in and out and lies to me bald-faced, I decide not to bring this is up. I merely stand there, arms folded neatly behind my back as she appears on the veranda, dark hair whipping about her angelic face.

Turning to her full, I recognize the expression playing her soft, near-ethereal features. Full lips pulled in an insipid smile, eyes focused yet not really here, she is trying to hide it, too—but she's hardly going to fool anyone. At least, not any _Jedi_; currents, thick with feelings blazing, are washing over her in a consuming deluge, in a flood that will sweep her away and close over her head. Will get the better of her if she lets it, will pull her into a sea where light is unfathomable, nonexistent.

Padme's is drowning in despair.

But I don't wish to bring this up, either. Her mind is tenuous, is a cord of spider silk dipped in a bloody ocean, and if I touch the wrong places, they may dissolve. And be lost, lost forever in depths unsearchable.

So I only nod to her, my head feeling obscenely bare in the nippy breeze. "I came as quickly as I—"

"Keep your voice down!" she hisses urgently, chocolate eyes wide. "_He'll_ hear you."

"He will…" I bite my lip, grimacing at more than just the metallic, sticky feel of blood on my tongue. I should've expected this. I should've foreseen this possibility, this wild, spinning nova that is the here and now—but I didn't. Lowering my tone to a breathy whisper, I say, "Oh. _Oh._ Padme…when exactly did he arrive?"

"Shortly after we broke contact," she answers. Her flit about, as if she believes death itself is looming behind her. "I think Palpatine must've somehow figured out that we're onto his game, Obi-Wan. Except for the life of me, I can't figure out how…"

Memories begin to pour into my consciousness, bringing to light the events of the past week. I remember being in the Jedi Archives, blue light washing over Anakin's face as he stooped over a file, his eyes drinking it in greedily. Then I seem to recall sidling up to him, touching his shoulder to grab his attention, and—and it happened. Happened so quickly that it's not until now that I remember his hand brush my robe, lingering there just long enough to accomplish its task.

Oh, stang.


	4. Till We Have Faces (part 5)

_ "Miracles are glimpses of reality."—C.S. Lewis_

Eyes narrowed to feline slits, I watch Padme stroll out onto the veranda, umber hair tossing about her slender shoulders and back. She pauses, glancing around nervously. Crosses delicate arms over a more delicate chest, then turns to face something, meets the eyes of a shadow I know is hovering just beyond my line of sight.

And then I catch it: a ruddy cloak, tossed aside before it catches the wind. It writhes, twisting in the wind like a playful nexu-cub, and for a moment I believe the shadow has come into view. It's his cloak, after all, so it's inevitable that I see the man himself engulfed in the robes, its hem whipping violently about his crouched form. As I slink out of my hiding place, however, the truth begins to dawn on me…and watch an empty robe ribbon under an emptier space.

Heart thudding chaotically behind my sternum, I leap forward, using the force to propel me toward the veranda. Padme whirls around, mouth open in silent exclamation, but she doesn't move. And she's no longer talking to anyone, isn't fixing her gaze on the shadow-man or his empty cloak. No, she just watches me, wordless, as I land cat-footed beside her, my chest heaving with scarlet feeling.

I face her, a being of twilight looming over a tiny, frangible child. "Where. Did. He. Go."

"I-I don't know what you're talking about," she answers, stammering. She takes a step back, eyes wide, sclera and cornea showing to the full. "Anakin, you're—"

"She's not the one you want to hurt, Anakin."

Wafting down on the quickening breeze, the voice is unmistakable. It's him, the shadow man. Is the figure that appeared to dissolve within his robes, and the presence I now feel looming over us, a sickly light pulsing in the night encroaching. "You're right, _Obi-Wan_. I want to know why you came here—and why you were with her in her office, too. Are you lonely without a Duchess spilling tears over your 'death'?"

The light freezes, fractures in places innumerable. "I'm here because she knows, Anakin. Not to further feed your insecurities."

"Says the man who deliberately _lied_ to me!"

"And you're trying to ruin me. I'd say we're even now, Anakin. Surrender, and soon we'll all move past this."

Lightning crackles through my vision, fracturing it for a split second. I blink hard, try to rub away the blur, but it's…well, I must've been seeing things. Right? I mean, it's not as though Obi-Wan has the power to alter senses or anything, even though he's doing a pretty blasted good job at evading my gaze at the moment. But I can hear him, and soon I catch a glimpse of ivory against the bruised skyline, his form stark and crouching atop a nearby parapet.

"_There_ you are," I mutter, and my lightsaber flies into my hand. This moment, this blip in the canvas of time, is it. This is my time, the instance of decision. The day of reckoning, when I'll either discover the truth about Obi-Wan…or realize I'm still being hoodwinked by a clever façade.

And when Obi-Wan springs from the parapet, I'm once more drowning in lightning-vision.


End file.
